Steve Downey, chief supply chain and patient support services officer of Cleveland Clinic, and Steven Chyung, chief supply chain and procurement executive at Oakland, Calif.-based Kaiser Permanente, said their responsibilities are moving outside hospital walls and into patient homes.
“Historically, supply chain folks’ most direct customers [were] clinicians and operators in hospitals and clinics,” Mr. Chyung said. “Now we’re interacting directly with members [patients]. That kind of customer service and expectations, it’s really a whole different dimension.”
For example, instead of taking truckloads of supplies to hospitals, health system supply executives will increasingly manage small and personalized deliveries to patients’ homes.
“The scope of what health system’s supply chains manage is going to keep getting broader,” said Mr. Downey, who manages 90% of Cleveland Clinic’s spend..
To improve the transition, Mr. Chyung recommended leaders improve supply chain data literacy throughout the organization, including front-line employees. When moving their skills from hospitals to homes, he said, “leadership is gonna have to build some kind of new muscle.”
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